Motivating operatives for suicide missions and conventional terrorist attacks
| Date | 01 October 2014 |
| Author | Kevin Siqueira,Daniel G Arce |
| DOI | 10.1177/0951629813511711 |
| Published date | 01 October 2014 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Journal of Theoretical Politics
2014, Vol.26(4) 677–695
ÓThe Author(s) 2013
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DOI:10.1177/0951629813511711
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Motivating operatives for
suicide missions and
conventional terrorist attacks
Daniel G Arce and Kevin Siqueira
University of Texas at Dallas, USA
Abstract
We investigate the problem of motivating terrorist operatives for suicide missions and conven-
tional terrorist attacks when operatives have either self-interested or social preferences that are
not observable by the terrorist organization. We characterize the screening mechanism for
selecting operatives according to their social preferences and determine under what conditions a
terrorist group will prefer to utilize suicide versus conventionaltactics. For example, when opera-
tives are intrinsically motivated and likely to be represented in the pool of potential recruits, a
terrorist organization will be more likely to employ suicide attacks as its soletactic of choice.
Keywords
Screening; social preferences; suicide missions; terrorism
1. Introduction
At least since Lebanon in the early 1980s,suicide attacks have been part of a terror-
ist organization’s tactics. Despite popular perception, however, suicide terrorism is
not solely the province of religious terrorist organizations. For example, according
to Merari (1998), most suicide attacks in Lebanon between 1983 and 1986 were car-
ried out by secular groups: of the 31 incidents, only seven were conductedby funda-
mentalist groups. Nor do terrorist organizations exclusively employ suicide tactics.
Even al-Qaeda and its affiliates resort to the occasional use of non-suicide attacks,
as was the case for the first World Trade Center bombing, the Al-Khobar mas-
sacres in Saudi Arabia, and the 2007 car bomb attempts in Piccadilly Circus and
Trafalgar Square.
Corresponding author:
Daniel G Arce, EconomicsProgram, GR 31, University of Texas at Dallas, 800 W. Campbell Road, Richardson,
TX 75080-3021, USA.
Email: darce@utdallas.edu
Given that groups as varied as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)
and Hezbollah have periodically employed suicide tactics over the last 30 years, it is
perhaps not surprising that a variety of explanations have been put forward to
explain their use. One rationale is their perceived effectiveness in coercing adver-
saries into meeting the terrorist group’s demands (Crenshaw, 2007). For example,
Pape (2005) argues that the objective of most suicide terrorism is to get rid of
foreign occupation. As the author claims, insofar as most attacks are against
democracies, groups utilizing suicide tactics are more likely to achieve their goals,
since democracies are likely to change their policies given their natural sensitivity to
terrorist events. The Lebanese experience is illustrative, as the US and France
removed troops from Beirut in response to suicide attacks. Another rationale for its
use is the suicide attack’s potential capability to successfully destroy its target, irre-
spective of whether the objective is to orchestrate a suicide bombing in a restricted
area, a mass killing, or the assassination of a key political figure. Moreover, a sui-
cide attack may be chosen over a conventional one when the former seems to be
more likely to succeed than the latter (Berman and Laitin, 2004).
1
Suicide attacks can also act as a signal of the depth of a group’s resolve and
may additionally serve as an instrument to attract further recruits and support.
Although suicide attacks and the specific targeting of civilians can backfire and
appall international audiences, as is believed to occur in the aftermath of the sui-
cide bombings conducted by Chechen separatists inside Russia, a group may nev-
ertheless feel compelled to utilize the tactic (perhaps even as a last resort) in order
to demonstrate the group’s relevance (Kalyvas and Sanchez-Cuenca, 2005). As a
showcase of the group’s commitment and message, as well as the underlying
emphasis that its impact may have on a targeted audience, perhaps as a shock tac-
tic, suicide missions may also be a means for a group to extract revenge or to retali-
ate for perceived past wrongs. They may also be used to prevent reconciliation of
its supporters with its adversary and to prompt the latter into engaging in acts of
repression that are self-defeating.
If suicide missions are as instrumental in achieving a terrorist group’s goals as
conventional attacks, a question arises as to how such groups recruit individuals
willing to carry out suicide missions just as some individuals are willing to carry
out other forms of extreme violence. Although the answer to this question can be
addressed in a variety of ways,
2
for our purposes, we focus on the types of opera-
tives that groups can choose from and the implications this has for the allocation
of tasks within a terrorist organization. In order to concentrate on this particular
question, we emphasize three main features. The first is that the terrorist organiza-
tion can enlist operatives to conduct either conventional or suicide attacks.
Secondly, we assume there is a degree of substitutability between suicide and con-
ventional tactics, albeit at differential costs and logistical probabilities of success.
Thirdly, we assume operatives are rational and can be one of two possible types:
those who have ‘normal’ opportunistic or self-interested preferences and those who
have some form of social preference. With respect to the latter type of operative,
we assume that an operative with social preferences may either identify with some
678 Journal of Theoretical Politics 26(4)
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